First Annual Canadian National Brain Bee is Taking Place at McMaster

"First Annual Canadian National Brain Bee is Taking Place at McMaster", May 2008

Just when you thought you could avoid psychology tests for the rest of the summer...it turns out that McMaster is hosting a whole slew of psych testing events on Saturday May 10^th 2008. The Canadian National Brain Bee is a competition that tests the neuropsychology knowledge of university students. This is the first of what will become an annual event. In order to get to this stage in the competition, the participants had to place high in events have been happening locally over the course of the year.

The upcoming competition is composed of five separate rounds, which test the participant’s knowledge in diverse ways as well as different kinds of ways. The first part is composed of a patient diagnoses, where actors are trained to act like they have a certain malady, and the participant must determine what it is in ten minutes by asking the actor yes or no questions. The second component is a neuroanatomy bell-ringer where the contestant must answer a question in less than two minutes based on the brain, brain slice or picture of a brain presented to them. Then it is lunch where there is free pizza for everyone participating and watching.

After lunch there is a video that recaps the events from the morning. The next component is a multiple choice question round with clickers [remember what the audience used to vote with on America’s Funniest Videos when we were kids? Those were early versions of clickers]. The clickers are given out to all of the members in the audience as well, so they can participate in the competition without being evaluated. Following that there is a cookie break. Afterwards there is another multiple choice question round, which is followed by another cookie break during which the judges tally points from all parts of the competition.

And then comes the deathly sudden death elimination round of death. The top five competitors advance to an oral elimination round, where they are asked to sit on a chair in front of the audience. They are then asked questions from "Neuroscience: Science of the Brain" and must answer them orally. The competition continues until there is only one participant left. If you want to access the text, you can do so from the International Brain Research Foundation or you can purchase it from The British Neuroscience Society.

If you aren’t doing anything on that day (or even if you are) all McMaster students and staff are invited to check out the competition. Come by the lobby of the Psychology Building anytime between 10AM and 1PM to participate in psychology demonstrations and activities. At 12:30PM events from the morning parts of the competition can be viewed (an audience is not permitted to watch due to space constraints). However you can be an active audience member, who competes and interacts with the contestants starting at 1:30PM.

If you would like additional information about this competition, please consult the Brain Bee website. If you are interested in possibly being a contestant in competitions next year, or would like more information in general, you can contact Dr. Judy Shedden (shedden@mcmaster.ca), or first year psychology professor, Dr. Joe Kim (kimjoe@mcmaster.ca) .

The event is being sponsored at the national level by the Canadian Institute of Health Research. McMaster is providing sponsorship from the Faculty of Science, the Department of Psychology, Neuroscience & Behaviour (PNB), http://www.science.mcmaster.ca/Psychology/ the McMaster Institute for Neuroscience Discovery and Study (MiNDS),the McMaster Clinical Learning Centre, the McMaster Educational Program in Anatomy, and
Telecom Computer.